


Web We Weave

by x_los



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-29
Updated: 2014-04-29
Packaged: 2018-01-20 12:40:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1510784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/x_los/pseuds/x_los
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Doctor/Master (Master/Adric), the Master explains to the Doctor exactly what he did to Adric in the Web (of bondage)." (a tidied old b_e kink meme fill) (original here: <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/best_enemies/13938.html?thread=247410#t247410">http://community.livejournal.com/best_enemies/13938.html?thread=247410#t247410</a>)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Web We Weave

**Author's Note:**

> Title: Web We Weave  
> Author: [](http://x-los.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://x-los.livejournal.com/)**x_los**  
>  Rating: R  
> Pairing: Five/Ainley!Master, suggestions of Adric/Ainley!Master  
> Summary: "Doctor/Master (Master/Adric), the Master explains to the Doctor exactly what he did to Adric in the Web (of bondage)." (a tidied old b_e kink meme fill) (original here: <http://community.livejournal.com/best_enemies/13938.html?thread=247410#t247410>)  
> Beta: [](http://aralias.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://aralias.livejournal.com/)**aralias**
> 
> ***

The Master had been in the cave longer, and he was weaker. The Doctor, who had only just stumbled in, could still break free of the spell of this place. He could set both of them free. But he was succumbing already, faster than the Master thought he had himself (though it was hard to judge, measure time, or indeed think at all when your will was unwinding). They were both pinned to the walls by creeper vines that stilled their minds even as they pinned their bodies.

“We’re going to die here,” the Doctor said, flatly. He didn’t seem very perturbed about it. “I’ll regenerate trapped, too confused get out. I’ll do it again and again, until there’s nothing left. I imagine it’ll take several days for me to die.” He paused, but then continued as though he couldn’t stop himself. “You won’t last that long.”

The Master grit his teeth, frustrated by the Doctor’s blunt assessment and by the way that, under the vines’ soporific control, he’d ceased even to sound like himself. The brisk edge of panic that normally inflected this Doctor’s voice in a crisis would have been familiar and welcome in comparison. But his frustration didn’t make the Doctor’s prophecy any less likely to come true. Nor was that the whole of it. The Doctor would watch the Master’s body rot on the wall, perhaps never realizing, in his regeneration-delirium, that the Master was anything other than an anonymous corpse—never grasping that he _knew_ that body. He wouldn’t know that the rotting flesh had ever held a man he had been acquainted with for centuries—a man who’d been extraordinarily important to him, at that.

Being someone the Doctor could simply forget had never appealed to the Master. The window of time in which either of them could act was fast closing.

“Did I ever tell you how I passed the time with your little pet while I waited for you to arrive in the city I made for you?” the Master began slowly, with what little strength he had left.

The Doctor blinked muzzily. “What was that?”

“I was so anxious for your arrival, but your girls took their time about bearing you to me. My acquisition of a healthy new body had left me with a great deal of excess energy to dispose of, and I had nothing to amuse myself with but your boy.” The Master grit his teeth, forcing the words out through them. “I had him give me a facsimile of you, just to take the edge off. One of the bodies I never got to taste—a wonderful thing, block transfer computation. And then I had another. So very lifelike. One might almost think they had real will of their own. It must have been wretched for the child, to watch the Doctor he loved like a father _beg_ for me to touch him. Of course it was all drawn out of his own mind, bent to my specification. I suppose there was little of it he didn’t experience himself, via your avatar.”

The Master’s face was slick and shining with sweat, and he managed to give the Doctor the ghost of a ghastly grin. Sickly pale, stirring slightly, the Doctor stared at him through narrowed eyes.

“You didn’t.” The Doctor blinked, twice. “No, you wouldn’t have. You have far better control of yourself than that, and you’re too proud of that control to waste it on such vile indulgences.”

“Or perhaps I’d do it with cheerful impunity, just because I could, hm? Perhaps I’d do a great deal, Doctor, to hurt something you loved. It would hardly be my first attempt. Perhaps, just to please myself, I buried the memory of it deep in his mind when I was done, yet didn’t bother to fully cleanse him of it, so that he suffered in dreams. They say that recollecting horrors in one’s sleep isn’t any more pleasant than waking memory.” The Master raised an eyebrow. “And perhaps I never told you because I wished to wait for the most perfect opportunity to do so.”

The Doctor curled his fist reflexively as if he wanted to punch the Master. His wrist strained against the vine. The Master’s eyes flickered as he noticed it. Good.

“But then I found I wasn’t content with a doll of you,” he tsked, “and you still tarried in the woods. I wanted live prey, Doctor. And there was your pet, strung up and helpless. Young. I thought of how young you were when you first let me bind you up like that. Remember how you asked me to? You were infinitely much more interesting, then. How it must torment you to remember how much you gave me, and how excessively willingly, before you tried to take it all away.

“I remember, it you don’t. I recall it perfectly. Your pet was comely enough to divert me. Not a patch on you at that age, naturally, and I’m afraid he didn’t make any sounds as pretty as the ones I’ve managed to coax out of you. But I made do in a pinch. You know, I don’t think he’d ever been with anyone before? The way his whole body shook around me—he was so very afraid of me, I must admit I was flattered. Perhaps he would have prefered you instead of me, if forced to choose. Did you ever get around to fucking him? No?”

“I would never,” the Doctor hissed, straining harder at the vines, “ _never_ have even considered it. He was just a child, he’d done nothing, it was me you wanted to hurt, how _could_ you—”

“Because of how fetching you look right now,” the Master sneered, “when you know that it’s _all your fault_.”

The Doctor was fully awake and aware now. His eyes were glinting murder, his chest heaved.

“Where is your little pet these days?” The Master rolled his head back and rested it against the stone wall as he speculated aloud. “I’ve not seen him since Castrovalva—tell me, did you manage to get him killed?” He chuckled at the Doctor’s gaunt expression. “Yes, I thought as much. Was it a _nasty_ death? Given the appalling situations you drag your band of disciples into, I assume it was painful, with an option on ‘explosive.’ As you correctly point out, Doctor, he was so _very_ young.” The Master chuckled. “Oh Doctor, quiver any harder in impotent rage and you’ll sprain something. Tell me, does it make it any better? Knowing poor, lamented Adric didn’t die a virgin? Not that I greatly mind, but it would have been something of a waste.”

The Doctor ripped himself free of the psychic control and the vines in one movement and was across the room, hands wrapping around the Master’s neck, pushing at the Master’s windpipe like he’d crush it. His face was chalk-pale, and a high, fever-red flush marred his cheeks. Around the blackening edges of his vision, the Master thought it a lovely picture. He began to laugh.

“Well done, Doctor,” he said breathlessly, speaking a little more freely when the Doctor eased the pressure on his throat. “You’ve managed to break free of the vines. Now, move quickly and we can escape here with our lives.”

The Doctor’s rage dropped, and he simply looked spent, aghast. “You—you said all of that, just to make me—”

“You’re free, aren’t you?” the Master drawled. “You were content to lie back and die until I provoked you. Now be a good fellow-sufferer and cut me down. There’s a large knife in my right boot.”

Silently, the Doctor slit the Master’s bonds, and together they escaped the cave. Outside in the sunlit clearing, the Doctor eyed him warily.

“How much of that was true?” The Doctor’s mouth was a stiff line. The Master chuckled.

“All of it. None at all. Some portion.” The Master turned to invade the Doctor’s space. “And if it is true, are you furious that I did it, or are you jealous that it wasn’t _you_ in the boy’s place, strung up and wanting?” The Doctor’s Adam’s apple bobbed tellingly before he pushed away his own reaction. The Master sighed. “A shame, Doctor. If you could let yourself have what you need, you’d be a great deal happier.” He ran a hand down the Doctor’s lapel. “I wouldn’t object to giving it to you, either.”

“If you did that to the Adric,” the Doctor stepped out of reach, caught his eyes and held them, “you would be an absolute monster. I could never forgive you. There would be nothing redeemable left in you. I could never even _look_ at you again.”

“Given _that_ lovely ultimatum, I see no reason to confirm your suspicions one way or the other.” The Master’s smile turned especially vicious. “Rest assured, Doctor, no matter what you do, I’ll _always_ look. You’re welcome for your freedom, incidentally.” He turned, and began the walk back to his own TARDIS. “Until next time, Doctor.”

 


End file.
